Keep Breathing
by madrigals
Summary: I want to change the world... instead, I sleep. Carter/OFC, AU seasons 4-6
1. do you see what i see?

Hi there!

I'm taking the plunge and posting the first couple chapters of this story. I've been a fan of ER for a long time (and writing for even longer), and basically this story is my way of coping with my frustration with the show's writers. I never see any decent Carter/OFCs, so hopefully this will compensate. As there is an OFC in this story, much of what takes place will be A/U — I trust everyone to be aware of what's real and what isn't. I'm fairly new to posting on this site, so if there's something in the author's note I'm forgetting or anything, please let me know! The story's set between seasons 4-6. Hope you take a chance on this one, and if you enjoy it thus far, leave a note! Thanks!

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DO YOU SEE WHAT I SEE?  
Christmas Eve 1997**

_say goodnight gracie, good night gracie_, and the unquestioning O of the barrel's end feeds me oxygen, spits in unnecessary breath . . . i'm _where oh i'm there with tears in my hair_, proud owner of a gun that memorizes lines of poetry and gets the last laugh by giving life instead of taking life away. _"you ain't gon' do nothing stupid, is you, sister?"_ yes. i am staying here, upright, unbroken, deserving of this air.

— 'and then she,' patricia smith

She is certain of many things.

For instance, she knows that every morning at five a.m., her body will rise with the dawn. And rain, sleet, snow, or shine — she will run, as fast as she can, as long as she can, until her lungs shudder with every breath she takes and she can no longer feel her legs; but none of those things matter, because she will be so at peace with herself, and nothing can ruin that feeling. For a girl who is never by herself, this hour of running is her only chance to be alone with her thoughts.

She knows that the same person will be there waiting when she returns home, every morning, without fail. He will greet her in Afrikaans and point out the copy of the Sun-Times that he'd dragged in from the front porch. She'll make tea, and they'll sit and chat in their native tongue until the time comes for her to leave the house and head on out to wherever she's going that day. She is certain of these things, for they have been her life for the past four years. They're all she has come to know. Rise, run, sip, chat, work; repeat. Monotony is a constant she clings to, even in the darkest of hours. It's a difficult thing to give up.

This is Cook County General Hospital: stuffed to the gills with patients waiting to be seen, a regular freak show free for the viewing public. Harried staff weave in and out of the crowd, and the snow falls thick outside, requiring her to dust the spare sprinkles off her coat-covered shoulders as she makes her way out of the ambulance bay. It's not unlike any other day. And if you were to ask her for honesty, it would be no contest — County's ER is one place where Gracie Abrahams is certain of nothing.

"Hey, Africa!"

She's greeted with exuberance by Doug Ross, who is stationed behind one of the computers at the admit desk. By habit, her nose wrinkles up into an indescribable expression at the nickname, which she'd been stuck with ever since being hired as a new nursing grad at County four years ago. She didn't really mind it, but seeing as the person who first originated the pet name was someone who she truly disliked, acting as if she hated it came with the territory.

"You working today?" Doug asks as she circles around the desk, pulling off her gloves and throwing them down on the counter next to him.

She purses her lips with a tight half-smile. "All day," she says, her tone of voice rather telling of her lack of enthusiasm. Doug chuckles knowingly, but before he can say anything, John Carter comes bustling up to admit, acknowledging Gracie with snarky words before she can even shrug her coat off.

"Where the hell have you been?" Carter demands, slapping a chart down in front of her. He looks angry, but he typically looks this way when working with her.

"Give me a goddamn break, I just got on," Gracie retorts rather wearily, adjusting the sleeves of her pink scrubs. She and Dr. Carter have never gotten along well — in fact, their enmity is the stuff of emergency room legend.

"I've been waiting for shift change for fifteen minutes!"

Gracie raises an eyebrow. He was trying her patience. She takes a deep breath in and rests her hands on the edge of the counter before replying, "Well, _goodness_, Doctor. Next time you decide to get ahead of yourself, and get _all_ worked up _fifteen_ minutes before the nurses' scheduled start time for the day shift, _please_, give me a call, I'll be sure to rush right in _just_ for you."

They exchange a wordless glare for a few moments, until Carter plows on, pulling an x-ray film out of the chart. "I've got a guy, came in with hemoptysis and night sweats, ten pounds weight loss in a week's time, and radiodensities all over his right lung," he reports, holding the film up to the light so she can see.

Gracie squints at the chest film, immediately spotting the very visible radiodensities. "TB," she says expressionlessly.

"That's what I thought, too, he looks just like a TB guy," Carter says, and she knew just the type he was referring to: semi-homeless looking beard, and the generally dirty appearance of one who has had more than their share of hardships in life. "I need you to go with him to CT."

"Can't I set my fucking things down first?"

"No, you cannot," Carter sing-songs, turning his back and walking away, leaving the chart and chest film behind with her. It's a good thing he didn't look back, because Gracie was looking daggers in his direction.

Doug watches the exchange take place, and once Carter is gone, leans over, murmuring sardonically, "Have yourself a merry little Christmas, right?"

She turns her scowl toward him, elbowing Doug in the ribs and stuffing the chest film inside the chart. She scoops the whole pile up and he chuckles the whole time, watching as she cradles the chart against her chest, pulling her stethoscope out of her bag and looping it around her neck. She stuffs a pen and her usual supplies into her pockets, adjusts her hospital ID, and asks Doug, "Can you throw my stuff in the lounge?"

He shrugs with a sort of _no problem_ expression, and adds on an afterthought, "Hey, when you're done with Carter, I've got a kid in four — newly diagnosed type one; could use some diabetic counseling."

"I am but your slave for the next twelve hours, Dr. Ross," Gracie sighs dramatically as she begins to walk away. Carol sweeps by at just the right moment, catching wind of Gracie's words in time to pipe in some of her own.

"Don't tell him that, it inflates his ego."

Heading into Exam Two, Gracie finds Chuny prepping TB guy for transport to CT. They greet each other warmly, and Chuny hands off the case before going to clock out the end of her shift. Gracie cleans the man's ET tube with a suction cath, and follows the transporters as they push the gurney out the door like sea captains maneuvering oil tankers through the straits of Hormuz. At radiology, she finds a moment to step out, take off her N3 respirator, and get a drink of water before finally getting to clock in officially for her shift. But she's called back rather quickly.

"You gotta take a look at this," the tech says. She hurries in to look at the screen, and the tech's muttering _aw, shit_, under his breath, and Gracie finds the next few moments difficult to fathom. TB guy's got an enormous mass on his frontal lobe. She's heard of tuberculosis massing elsewhere in the body, where it's less potent than respiratory TB, but never before has she heard of brain TB.

This means she'll have to call Carter. Gracie swears loudly.

Carter is called to radiology, and one look is taken at the scans before an OR is booked. TB guy is taken up to surgery to get his brain cut open, and Gracie is left to return to the ER, marveling to herself over the oddity.

When she gets back, she notices that the nurses are rather giggly. A little _too_ giggly. But it's an absent observation, since she's too busy flipping through the chart of Dr. Ross's diabetic kid to really pay attention. She should have become suspicious when Conni calls to her, "Hey, Africa, hand me that pen, will you?" _Should_ have. Gracie still doesn't catch on, her eyes focused on her chart, her hand blindly reaching out for the pen in question, her feet on autopilot across the admit area, heading towards where Conni stands on the other side of the counter. She's so inattentive, that she's shocked when she runs straight into Carter.

He yelps, "Hey, watch it!"

She jumps back in surprise. She snaps, "_Sorry_. Didn't see you there."

"Pay more attention!"

Lydia's grinning. "Hey, guys..." She points, and the two slowly look upward.

They are standing under mistletoe.

Gracie still doesn't get it. She knows what mistletoe is, knows how popular it is as a Christmas decoration, but isn't keen to the traditions that follow it. The whole idea of 'kissing under the mistletoe' has always been a Hollywood fantasy to her, something that occurs in movies, and needless to say, Gracie isn't the type to analyze her life with starry eyes. She makes no connection between A and B.

Carter groans. "Oh, _come on_..."

"Nope!" Conni exclaims, clearly thrilled at this little sting operation the nurses had thrown together — what was apparently their idea of a very funny joke. "You _gotta_ do it! It's tradition!"

"Do what?" Gracie asks, confused. "What's tradition?"

"Nothing," Carter says immediately, wanting to brush off the whole matter. He turns his attention back to the little audience they have garnered, pointing fiercely, as if the act would drive his point home any better. "I'm not doing it."

"You _have_ to! And none of that cheek stuff!"

"Do _what_?"

Carter looks extremely annoyed, and Gracie, for one, can't blame him. But she's shocked beyond belief when he leans over, and quickly presses his lips to hers. It's so brief that it almost seems like it didn't even happen, but it does, and when he pulls away and storms off without a word, Gracie remains behind, stock still. If she had been cold before, now she was warmed down to her toes.

And now she feels incredibly stupid for falling into this trap. She's simultaneously angered at the nurses, for arranging it, and Carter, for letting it happen. She hates him even more for that. It's quiet until Cynthia asks innocently, "It's_ Geseënde Kersfees_, right, Gracie?" The words snap her back to the present.

Gracie announces immediately, to the amusement of the nurses, "I hate everyone." She hugs the chart to her chest before she, too, storms off.

The nurses smirk, while Cynthia looks on in confusion.

What is left to be certain of?

----


	2. think warm thoughts

**THINK WARM THOUGHTS  
January 1998**

"I heard a little rumor."

Gracie can't help but roll her eyes at Mark Greene, who is looking a little too amused for words. She is trying to busy herself at the computer by admit, but takes a moment to glance over her shoulder and glare at the first nurse she sees, which happens to be Haleh. "It's not true," she says dryly, desiring to focus on her computer task rather than give this conversation much acknowledgment. "There are no birthdays for Gracie."

Mark gives her a sly look, like he knows the ulterior motive for her hating of birthdays — not wanting to turn another year older. He is wrong, of course. Gracie has never liked her birthday. "And how old are you _not_ today?"

"Definitely _not_ twenty-six."

Haleh, who has been eavesdropping, swings by. "Goodness, twenty-six? And you don't want a birthday?"

"I don't want to _discuss_ my birthday."

"I'd kill to be twenty-six again, and to have your body? Good Lord —"

At least she gets Gracie to chuckle. "Yes, thank you, Haleh."

"Well, happy _un_-birthday," Mark acquiesces. She thanks him, but she barely gets the words out before Carter and some blonde girl come rushing in through the double doors with a patient in tow. They've already got him on a gurney, and Carter's calling some orders down the hall to Chuny as they go. Mark and Gracie give each other quizzical looks, and make their way to Trauma One.

"Dr. Carter?" Mark's questioning tone speaks volumes.

"Hey, I found this guy!" Carter seems almost proud, like he's stumbled upon something great. "Unconscious, over by the medical school!"

Gracie's pulling on some latex gloves, watching the scene in trauma unfold with a wary gaze. She's unsure who the girl is, but is certain that she doesn't really belong. "Okay, let's be very careful on transfer," Carter announces as everyone prepares to move the guy to the next gurney. "Don't wanna give him an arrhythmia. One, two, three..."

The guy looks homeless. Most of the nurses have a name for this type of patient — a bumsicle. Dirty and disheveled, with a distinct smell that Gracie has a difficult time stomaching. "You are?" Mark asks of the blonde girl.

"I'm Laura Brown." Gracie hides a smirk as the girl sticks her hand out to shake Dr. Greene's, but is ignored. "I'm observing Dr. Carter."

"Second year med student, wants to see what it's all about," Carter chimes in as he begins his examination of the bumsicle. This is starting to make more sense now, as Carter had been required to give a seminar today. He has a thing for blondes. This is all a matter of trying to look impressive.

"BP's eighty palp, pulse is fifty-two," Gracie interrupts, a hint of annoyance in her voice as she checks vitals. She goes to start a line.

"Okay, let's get a core temp, CBC, and a twelve lead."

Things are moving fast, and her nose keeps latching on to a very subtle scent of alcohol. She wants to open her mouth about it, but Carter's already barking out orders again. "All right everybody," he says, "let's prep for a pleural lavage, c'mon, every second counts!"

Mark looks unconvinced. "Pleural lavage?"

"Yeah, I'm thinking active core re-warming," Carter responds boyishly. Laura Brown's carrying an expression of awe, and all Gracie can think about is how disturbingly young she seems next to other women her age. _If this is what they're letting into medical school these days_, she ponders, _then I'd graduate with flying colors._ "It's ten degrees outside, this guy's a popsicle."

"Perhaps you'd like to get a blood alcohol instead, Doctor?" Gracie queries, trying to hint at what was, to her, plainly the correct course of treatment.

"Hey," someone else observes, "this guy shit his pants."

Carter says nothing for a minute, and Gracie wonders whose words he is pondering exactly. But then he replies breezily, "No, I think this will do just fine, Nurse Abrahams. Perhaps you'd like to get a rectal temp?"

"Carter..." Mark says warningly.

"No, it's all right, Dr. Greene," Gracie interrupts bitingly, "I live to make extraordinarily unnecessary contributions to the trauma room."

Not that she truly cared. She just hated who was running this.

Gracie prepares to carry out orders, all the while wearing a look of disgust on her face. "Wow, it's a real team effort, isn't it?" Laura Brown remarks, evidently not catching on to the feuding at hand. Carter and Gracie glare at each other over the patient, and Gracie's thinking of Christmas Eve and how a team effort had played out _there_. It only serves to irritate her more.

Carter echoes, "Yeah, real team effort."

Next thing Gracie knows, he's talking about a bypass, or dialysis, and she knows it's only to piss her off. That is, after all, what he lives for.

Later, when she is finally off duty, Gracie returns home to a darkened foyer and a television blaring in the living room. She tosses her keys down on the hall table and shrugs off her coat as she makes her way into the kitchen, calling out "_Goeienaand, Oupa_," as she prepares some orange blossom tea. She receives no response. She peeks her head into the living room to find Oupa fast asleep in an armchair, a trail of oxygen tubing scattered all over the place.

She sighs, and straightens the tubing for her grandfather. She spreads a throw blanket over him, and turns the volume down on _Jeopardy_. She whispers, "_Ek is lief vir jou_," and presses a kiss to the top of his head.

With that, she returns to the kitchen, back to her tea and a scraped-together dinner. She eats in silence at the kitchen table, and after an adjustment to her insulin pump, will later slip into bed without much fanfare.

Some birthday.

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	3. exodus

**EXODUS  
February 1998**

To say he suspects would be a lie.

It's completely ordinary, to be standing here, examining the damage this child has inflicted on his cornea — result of an adventure involving tinker toys and a rigged-up slingshot hurtling at great speed. He's taking part in his last week of an ophthalmology rotation, called to consult in the ER on this _groundbreaking_ case, while Gracie stands close behind him, inspecting his work with an overabundance of interest. She is close behind him, with a mission in mind.

Why he doesn't catch on is beyond her.

"Will there be any permanent damage?" The mother asks, her worried tone more than overcompensating for the child's lack of agitation.

"I see no laceration," Carter says, leaning back on his stool and nearly catching Gracie off guard. She recovers quickly. "Just an abrasion of the cornea. It'll hurt for a while, but should heal just fine."

"But he'll be able to see?"

He gets this expression on his face, this mildly amused, yet gently reassuring expression that has this tendency to drive her insane. He tells the mother, "His vision will be fine." Gracie hops out of Carter's way as he stands up, her task now complete. "I'm going to prescribe some antibiotic eye-drops, and Nurse Abrahams here will need to update his tetanus. But you, Mikey, will be just fine!" He ruffles the little boy's hair, and Gracie dutifully follows Carter out of the exam room. She keeps her distance, waiting for the moment to drop.

At admit, she takes the chart back from Carter after he is done with his notes, and in her head she is whistling innocently. He's in such spirits that it doesn't take long for him to reach his hands down into the pockets of his lab coat.

Carter shouts, horrified, ripping his hands out of his pockets to find them covered in some sort of horrible, clear, mucousy-looking slime. It oozes off his fingers and drips onto his nice leather shoes, and all the nurses at admit are doubled over with hysterical laughter; Gracie included.

"What the _hell!_"

Then he notices the collection of empty SurgiLube packets Gracie has displayed on the counter. She's getting high fives, and she's giving him a sly smirk, and his eyes narrow, and by God there's nothing more he'd like to do than throttle her. Instead, he points at her menacingly, and stalks away to wash his hands.

But it starts later, with the plant workers.

They come in screaming, soaked in solvent, lugging with them a co-worker in respiratory distress. Gracie and Kerry Weaver are at his side immediately, and Gracie tries to protect the man's airway, while at the same time trying to protect her own from the overpowering smell of solvent. But it all gets too hectic, too fast. Weaver's about to listen to the guy's lungs when she collapses to the floor, unconscious, taken over by the fumes. Gracie is so caught up in the plant worker's sats that she can only watch as Carter, back in the department, stops to help. He's checking the plant worker over as Weaver starts to seize, and a moment later he tears himself away to help support her own airway.

And it all feels so ominous, like she's a spectator of a movie, or at least a really great play. It's difficult to focus on the moment when so much of this feels like it isn't happening. Gracie and Lily try to handle the care of the plant worker as chaos erupts, waiting for a doctor to get back and order his treatment, but everyone gets swept up. Mats are put all over the floor to prevent the tracking of solvent, and a mad scramble is made to move patients away from the fumes, to close to paramedics, to do anything about this situation at all.

"This is getting ridiculous," Gracie mutters to Lily, as she holds an oxygen mask over the plant worker's face and checks his O2 level. He's gasping, his chest shuddering with every breath, and the three of them are relatively ignored as the rest of the ER erupts into chaos.

"Sats are down to eighty-two," Lily replies quietly.

Gracie says nothing for a moment, then says decisively, "I'm going to intubate," moving firmly and confidently as she gathers what is needed.

"Gracie —"

"Lily, fifteen of Etomidate and a hundred of succs, please," is all Lily receives in reply. It's not like Gracie doesn't have the privilege to intubate, she had trained intensively in the area, but it's generally more acceptable to wait for a doctor.

Yet Lily pushes the drugs, and Gracie is opening her laryngoscope, telling the gasping plant worker, "Manny, I know your wife's on the way, but I need to intubate you now. You're gonna feel kind of sleepy in a minute, and when you wake up, there'll be a tube in your mouth to help you breathe."

He's out a minute later, and Gracie has the blade of the laryngoscope pushed past his tongue when Carter comes sweeping by. "What are you doing?"

"I'm intubating this man," Gracie replies matter-of-factly, her tone absent as she spends her time concentrating on properly placing the ET tube.

Carter forgets whatever he was doing and rushes to the bedside, tugging on latex gloves and hovering over Gracie as she, despite his reaction, expertly places the ET tube. "You wait for a physician, Gracie, you know that!"

"I'm sorry, would you rather I let him go into arrest?"

He says nothing, visibly torn between anger and distraction — as if habit tells him that this is what he should be focusing on, but the ongoing situation says otherwise. "Get ready to bag him," Gracie says idly, a second later announcing, "I'm in." She removes the laryngoscope, takes her stethoscope from around her neck, and listens to the man's lungs as Lily begins to bag him.

"Oh, sure, let's all ignore policy —"

She rips the device from her ears. "Lily, keep bagging, I'm going to get a vent, and you —" Gracie points at Carter as she begins to bustle away. "I'm not dealing with you right now."

"I'm not dealing with you, either!" He shouts after her. All he receives is a rather dismissive wave in return before she completely disappears from sight.

It seems like ages later when the paramedics come storming in through the double doors, despite the calls placed to close to trauma. Corday is with them, and with the two extra gurneys and the influx of people clogging the main hallway, it becomes more noisier than ever before. Gracie is stuck behind one of the gurneys when Carter snaps and shoves his way to the front of the arguing crowd.

"Everybody shut up!" Carter yells. "Everybody shut up!"

The silence becomes deafening.

"We are going to evacuate the _entire_ ER," Carter announces authoritatively, despite how out of the blue this decision seems. "Check _every_ room. All contaminated patients and staff go to the ambulance bay right now."

Malik asks how to know if you're contaminated.

"If you've got a spot on your skin, if you've got a spot on your gurney, if you've got a spot on your clothes, go outside _right now_."

Gracie knows this means she's contaminated. She had treated the plant worker. She's not thrilled to have to go out into the cold, but she obliges. With the arrival of Hazmat comes decontamination, in the form of showering outdoors.

She shudders as she stands under the rushing water, soaked to the bone in her bra and panties, getting scrubbed down as she watches Carter rush around the ambulance bay with a newfound air of authority. Every now and then she sees his eyes dart in her direction, as if he wants to make sure of where she's situated at all times. She wouldn't think more of it if this feeling hadn't already began stirring.

She feels guilty.

For four years she's known Carter; for four years she has watched him go from a bumbling med student, to a surgical intern, straight into emergency medicine. For four years she has worked with him, argued with him, triumphed with him, and loathed him. And now it's as if he's transformed into a _doctor_. Right in front of her very eyes. It's disconcerting in the wildest way. And the guilt for her prank this afternoon swirls in her gut, in a way she hates intensely. She feels guilty for this afternoon, but even more so for how they have treated each other.

She knows there's a word for this, she just can't put her finger on it.

Gracie changes into a new pair of scrubs and is off at the word _go_, her wet hair flapping in the wind as she rushes to get up to the cafeteria before anything else could possibly go wrong. She hears briefly about an elevator stuck between floors, but has no time to think about it. Her services are needed upstairs.

But hours later, after cafeteria codes and non-stop moving, after a return of triumph to the ER proper, Gracie finds herself hit with a thud of realization on her way home. It's enough to stop her dead in her tracks in the middle of the sidewalk, mostly for the surprise of the feeling.

She respects him.

----


	4. my brother's keeper

Thanks to my reviewers! Your kind words are so appreciated! Here's a short update for now.

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******  
MY BROTHER'S KEEPER  
March 1998**

With respect, comes distance.

Gone were the days of mean-spirited practical jokes and biting words. She finds it difficult to fully avoid him, but she does the best she can, and if she were to be completely honest with herself — it's like a weight lifted off her shoulders.

Today, she wasn't so successful.

"You're a nurse, and you still smoke?"

Her eyes dart up quickly, taking in Carter's lanky form as she wraps her black cardigan a little more securely around her body. She draws the cigarette back to her lips, replying, "You forgot to mention the diabetes."

"That's _right!_ So does this mean you're suicidal, should I be calling psych down here?" Carter stuffs his hands into the pockets of his lab coat, ambling idly around the ambulance bay as he speaks. He isn't entirely sure why, now, after everything, he's conversing with someone whom he once referred to as the bane of his existence — but after tonight, it seems a bit instinctual. She wonders why he isn't upstairs, with his cousin — that's where family should be, right? — but doesn't question him about it. She can't blame him for wanting a little bit of fresh air.

Gracie gives him a sarcastic look, one that is clearly unappreciative of his comment, and inhales. "I don't do it very often."

"Once a week?"

"Try once a year."

"Seriously?"

She sighs, reaching up and running a hand through her hair, carrying an expression that suggests exhaustion. Concerns at home are weighing heavily on her shoulders. "It's just been a long day," Gracie replies. She looks away awkwardly, like she doesn't want to be this honest with him.

He's quiet for a moment. Finally, he says, "Yeah, yeah it has, hasn't it?"

Carter leans against a wall nearby, hands in his pockets, eyes in any direction he can settle on. He looks weary, like how she feels, and she has a hard time believing that someone with a net worth of hundreds of millions of dollars could feel the way she does. It just serves to remind her how human we all are.

He asks, "Are the lab results back on our guy in Trauma One?," referring to a man who had been brought in shortly before an overdosed Chase Carter had been brought in with his junkie friends. The patient in question had run his truck off the road, egressed the vehicle via windshield, and had to be cut out of a tree some fifty feet in front of the truck.

Gracie exhales and nods. She remarks absently, "Blood alcohol's... oh, you know, somewhere in the _dead_ range."

Carter grimaces. "He's young, with a job, and successful enough to afford a new truck to be launched out of at high velocity. Why would anyone throw their life away like that?"

She flicks more ashes onto the ground, giving him an indifferent look. "Has a bed in ICU opened up yet?"

"Working on it. Personally, he hasn't got much of a chance."

"His wife said he was on his way to see his daughter dance in her ballet recital."

"And he was driving drunk?"

Gracie blows smoke out of her nose. She says, "I used to dance ballet."

He's struck silent. Suddenly, they feel no more need to force conversation.

She gives him one last look before tossing her cigarette to the ground, standing and stamping on the butt. She mutters some kind of condolence about his cousin, then heads inside, leaving Carter behind to watch her departure.

----


	5. of past regret and future fear

**OF PAST REGRET AND FUTURE FEAR  
April 1998**

It's busy today.

Trauma after trauma comes through those doors, and after a while Gracie begins to truly believe her feet will fall off from overuse. Trying to find a light at the end of the tunnel in the middle of all this madness is exceptionally difficult. There is no time to eat, let alone sit and breathe. Hers is a downward spiral.

She doesn't recognize the symptoms, despite possessing the king of all headaches and an inability to pay attention to anything. She stands here, having been exiled to the drug lock-up, checking the expiration dates on various medications, but it's getting harder and harder to focus on the words. Her hands shake, and it feels ridiculously warm in here, and if she were able to see the expression on her face she'd find a glassy look to her eyes. She's had this before — years ago, but never this bad. If she had been clear and levelheaded, she would know what this means. But any chance of salvaging herself is long gone.

It happens just as Carter makes his way into the drug lock-up to fetch something. She collapses, nearly taking an entire shelf of medications down with her. And suddenly, the past is forgotten. Carter rushes to her side, catches her before she hits the floor, and supports her head as she begins seizing.

He must think quickly as his shouts for help go unheard. Her seizure is clearly of the tonic-clonic variety, and two to three minutes pass before it finally ends. Her airway is open. She's breathing. He checks her pulse the old-fashioned way and finds her tachy at 112. She's into the post-ictal phase now, deeply asleep after the trauma of the seizure. He has a feeling that if he were to check, he'd find her in severe hypoglycemia. It's only when he manages to flag down Malik and get a gurney, that anything looks brighter. They catch Weaver on their way into Trauma Two, and she's a mix of shocked and harried as she follows them.

"What _happened_?"

"I saw her collapse in the drug lock-up," Carter replies as they transfer her from the gurney to the hospital bed. He interrupts himself, "— Let's get her on a monitor and do an Accucheck," while Malik and a young female nurse scramble to follow orders. Then he looks back up at Weaver, scratches his head as if confused, and continues, "Tonic-clonic seizure, lasted about two to three minutes I'd say. She's still in post-ictal. Something tells me hypoglycemia."

"Accucheck says 30," Malik chimes in with impeccable timing.

"Whoa-oa, survey says... start a line, let's get an amp of D50 in."

Weaver nods, taking all this information in with a thoughtful, but concerned expression. "Get an EEG, and put her on a nasal cannula as well. I'll check into Gracie's emergency contact information. John, you got this?"

"Yeah, go on ahead," Carter says absently, his focus on Weaver completely gone as his attention shifts to Gracie's insulin pump to check the basal and bolus dosages. "Malik, let's also get a CBC, Chem 7, check the urine, and how 'bout we start out with 100 milligrams of thiamine, IV."

"You got it."

It is not until a half hour later that Gracie comes out of post-ictal, but it's not for another two hours that her confusion and drowsiness finally subsides. He finds himself standing in the doorway to Exam Four then, hands resting in the pockets of his white coat as his eyes drink in the scene before him.

The light in the room is dim, but he can still note every single feature of the young woman laying in bed. It's odd for him to see her this way — clad in a hospital gown, dwarfed by the size of the hospital bed. She sits halfway up in bed, just enough so that her eyes can properly focus on an administration newsletter. She's burrowed under a series of blankets, but it's easy for him to spot the collection of saline locks in the top of her right hand and the side of her wrist, leading to tubing that's connected to a handful of medication bags hanging from an IV pole. The machine that monitors how much of the medication she received — and how fast her body got it — beeped gently. She still wears a nasal cannula, and it only reinforces his thought of how different she looks. No makeup, not that she needs it; just pale, sallow looking skin. The only thing that looks remotely the same is her hair — same wavy, honey brown tresses, swept back into a messy chignon, her bangs gently brushing the sides of her forehead.

Carter stands there for another moment, before realizing that she hasn't even noticed his presence. He clears his throat, earning a slightly dazed look in his direction. Gracie blinks, before recognition kicks in and she groans. "What do you want now, Carter?" Her bored tone of voice seems to be more out of habit than anything else, and he smirks playfully at her greeting, stepping further inside.

"So, why weren't you keeping on top of your sugar?"

She doesn't say anything, instead gazing simply in his direction. He isn't quite sure what the look means, but he lets his eyes connect with her own, and after a moment or two, she merely shrugs and gives him a wistful smile. "I have a bad relationship with my pancreas," she replies. He raises an eyebrow in return.

"You could have gone into a coma, Gracie."

She cuts him off before his words can venture any further. "Yeah, I know, thank you, Doctor," she says, her voice tinged with sarcasm. For a second she sounds like the same girl he's always known. But then her expression changes, and her eyes drift to the top blanket. She runs her fingertips over it. "Could have been worse," she muses softly. "Could have been a lot worse."

The silence that follows is cumbersome, and Carter stands there, rubbing the back of his neck and looking quite unsure of what to say. They had never been this cordial before. He grabs her chart and flips through it, before glancing up to the bedside monitor keeping track of her pulse, sats, and blood pressure. "How are you feeling?" he asks, setting the chart aside and taking down his stethoscope.

"Okay. I feel a little weak, but I'm okay."

He motions for her to sit up, and he listens to her heart and lungs. "Yeah, that's to be expected," Carter replies when he's done, looping the stethoscope back around his neck and making a note in the chart.

"Look, I really need to get home."

"Gracie, I don't think that's —"

She retorts swiftly, "There are no ketones in my urine, my EEG's back to baseline, and my serum glucose is up to 105, which is the most normal it's been in a week, so please, Dr. Carter, if you don't mind, I would like to go home."

They look at each other in a battle of wills, and no sound is uttered in this room until they are interrupted by the entrance of Malik. Malik is unable to get a word in, for Carter jumps at the chance first. "Malik," he says, beginning to scribble out discharge orders, "you can stop the IV, Africa's going home."

"Home?" Even Malik looks a bit surprised.

"Yes, home," Carter says, tossing her chart onto the foot of the bed. Then he looks at Gracie. "I'll be back to take you."

"_Take_ me?"

"You will _not_ be traveling alone, I will take you, be ready to go in twenty minutes." To Malik, he says, "Buff her up and check her glucose one more time, then kick her out, we need the bed."

Then he leaves.

He doesn't see her until later, when she's standing by admit in her scrubs and a black overstuffed down jacket, waiting for him to finish up signing out a patient so he can sneak out of the hospital before the end of his shift. She has her bag draped over her shoulder, and she waits for him with a weak air of mild annoyance. "Carter, you don't have to do this," she tells him with an exhausted sigh, "I'm a few blocks away, I'll walk, I always walk —"

He gives her a belligerent, no-nonsense expression, returning his chart to the stack and grabbing his coat. "And I could use some fresh air," he retorts, pulling on his coat and ushering her toward the ambulance bay doors. "Jerry, I'll be back in thirty," he calls over his shoulder, and they disappear into the early evening.

For a while, nothing is said. He follows the path she sets out on, eyeing her slow, weak gait carefully. When they reach a corner, she speaks.

"Listen, uh..." Gracie pauses awkwardly, looking everywhere but at him. "Malik told me about what you did for me. And I just want to say thank you."

Carter shrugs. "It was nothing."

"You saved my life, Carter," she chuckles softly to herself, as if she couldn't believe their situation. She glances up at him, and he can tell her next words are sincere. "I know that's your job and all, but still. You could have walked away. We haven't been on the best of terms, I wouldn't have blamed you."

He can feel a lump surprising him in his throat, one that he quickly swallows before speaking. "I did what anyone else would have done in my position. That's all."

"Still, thank you."

A genuine smile can be felt spreading across his face, and he takes an awkward moment to simply nod and say, "You're welcome."

The only thing that comes close to this is their manner in the trauma room, one of doctor and nurse working together to save a life. But this is different, this is almost friendship. They cross an intersection, and Carter clears his throat again, searching for the right words to say in the middle of all this awkward quietude. Finally, he says, "I think we got off to the wrong start."

"Did we?"

"Let's start over," Carter stops abruptly in the middle of the sidewalk, sticking out his hand for her to shake, which she merely stares at with a raised eyebrow. "My name's John Carter, what's yours?" A unbelieving laugh bubbles forth from her lips, and it takes a moment for her to realize that he's serious. She hesitates before slipping her hand into his warm grasp.

"Gracie Abrahams," she says softly. He knows that, of course, and she pronounces it just the same as she always has: _abe-rums_. It rolls effortlessly off her tongue, highlighting her obvious accent.

He smiles and shakes her hand blatantly, getting a laugh out of her. "Gracie, it's a pleasure to meet you; that accent, is it African?"

Their attempt at reintroduction is so laughable, but she plays along as they begin to amble forward slowly. "Yeah, kind of, my dad's Italian, but he was born in South Africa and moved to the States for college. My mom worked at the South African consulate in Los Angeles. They got married and had my brother and all that, and then moved back to Bloemfontein, and then I was born; so yeah, South African."

Carter wasn't sure what to say; he didn't expect her to be so forthcoming. But this was their starting over, after all. "So what do you do?"

She laughs, a full-bellied one that she didn't anticipate. "I'm a nurse," she plays along, still chuckling. "Down in the ER."

"A nurse, what a respectable profession!"

"And I take it you're a doctor." She reaches up to nonchalantly scratch an itch on the bridge of her nose.

Carter laughs heartily. "Whatever gave you that idea?"

"The lab coat gives you away."

He looks down at the white coat and teal green scrubs he wears under his outer coat, one hand rising to touch the stethoscope still looped around his neck. He laughs. "Yeah, I guess it does."

They come up on a small, modest one-story, its front porch dwarfed by a light dusting of snow, and Gracie stops on the front stoop with a bit of hesitation, stuffing her hands into her pockets and looking around. "You know, a doctor saved my life today," she says softly. "Down in the ER. We were... really busy, trauma after trauma came in and I had no time to eat. I didn't even realize my blood sugar had been dropping all day, even though I had an awful headache and couldn't pay attention worth shit."

Carter watches her with an inquisitive expression. She pauses and smiles, lightly shaking her head. "I was really clumsy, too; they actually sent me out of a trauma to go restock the drug lock-up — it was that bad, I guess. And this doctor, he came to get something and saw me collapse. You know, he and I used to be really mean to each other; everyone called us rivals. But instead of walking away when I started seizing, he helped me." Her words fall faint near the end. "Hey, you're a doctor, maybe you know him."

He swallows another rising lump. "Maybe." His voice sounds hoarse, and he clears his throat yet again before speaking. "So, you and this doctor, are you guys gonna be friends now?"

Before she can reply, a croaking, elderly male voice that Carter did not expect, calls through an open window out to the porch, "_Gracie, is dit u?"_

And for a moment, Gracie appears to be a deer caught in headlights. She has never much been one for sharing her home life with the workplace, and even now, with a supposed starting over, it feels like a shock to the system for Carter to be this close to everything she holds so dear. Hearing this voice, suddenly he understands why Gracie was so hesitant to have him walk her home.

It is their moment of clarity.

"Maybe," she whispers finally. "Maybe."

----


	6. day for knight

Just in case you haven't caught on, this story is being written according to the happenings of each episode... sort of like getting brief glimpses of Gracie's life from each season. Maybe if she were a real character, these would be considered her "best-ofs." Who knows. I don't know. Any way, I'm a little iffy on these most recent chapters, but I think they get the job done. Enjoy. 

* * *

**DAY FOR KNIGHT  
September 1998**

A young woman pushes her way up to the admit desk, moving insistently and arriving at the counter with an anxious, vociferous air. Gracie, who is standing by the window and making notes in a chart, doesn't even look up at the girl — but it turns out that it doesn't even matter, for the panicking woman speaks first, demanding attention in the most obnoxious kind of way.

"Do you have a bathroom?" She bangs her hands on the counter.

Gracie glances up, eyebrow quirked. "What?"

"Can I use your bathroom? I just made out with a guy who has herpes — you have to let me use the goddamn bathroom!"

Gracie blinks, aghast. She has no idea what to say, so she says nothing, pointing with her writing hand in the direction of the restrooms. The girl runs off.

"Did she say what I think she said?" Jerry asks poignantly, and Gracie looks up at him with a meaningful glance. Then she shakes her head with disbelief and mutters something about Americans. "I'll take that as a yes."

"Africa!"

She looks over her shoulder at this familiar sing-song tone, finding Carter making his way into admit, wearing his usual work attire and a rather overgrown beard. "Hello, Carter," she greets him absently, focusing her gaze back on the chart in hand. "I see you've decided to scare your new med student."

"I see _you've_ decided to skip lunch again."

Gracie rolls her eyes. Reconciliation and friendship apparently keep a severe case of mother hen syndrome in tow. "I decided to eat in half an hour, is that okay, _Dad_?"

"Because waiting is the most logical thing to do."

"The decision doesn't have to be logical, it was unanimous."

"Unanimous? Gracie, it's not unanimous if you're the only one voting."

Carter stops here, placing in front of her a pre-packaged salad and a bottle of grape juice. She blinks, then looks back at her chart, replying in an absent, sing-song voice, "I don't take food from men who haven't shaven in ten days."

"_Ten_ days? You are grossly over-exaggerating."

"Jerry, tell Bigfoot here he's shedding on my chart."

"Why don't both of you shut up?"

Carter smirks at Jerry's mildly amused tone. While most of the staff appreciate Carter and Gracie's newfound lack of rivalry, their idea of pleasant banter has a tendency to get on others' nerves. He sweeps around her side, placing a hand on both of her shoulders. He leans in close to her ear and says, "If you don't eat now, I'm going to check your blood sugar every twenty minutes until you do."

She murmurs a noncommittal response, and just before he moseys off again, she says idly, "Play nice now, don't want Lucy to call Channel Five reporting a Sasquatch sighting."

He merely laughs in reply, and despite everything, she glances over her shoulder and opens the salad when Carter is out of sight.

----


	7. stuck on you

**STUCK ON YOU  
November 1998**

"It's just _wrong_."

Thunder cracks outside as Gracie draws labs on an unconscious male patient in Exam One. She watches the guy's blood drip into assigned tubes as she shakes her head with a weary smirk. It's approaching daylight hours, but Gracie has been on all night — having reluctantly taken on a twenty-four hour shift, starting at 5pm the previous day. She has another twelve hours to go before being set free, and she was grateful (to say the least) when Malik clocked in for the day shift. He provided a much needed breath of fresh air after the insanity that was graveyard.

She glances up from under her eyelashes at Malik, who stands across the room, hooking up a banana bag to a deeply snoozing drunk. "_How_ is it wrong?"

"Men and women can't relate to each other," Malik replies, and Gracie snorts in response as she withdraws the needle from her kid's intravenous line and tosses out the biohazards. "_What?_ It's true! They live such different lives."

"I don't get why people make it such an issue," Gracie laughs, stripping off her latex gloves. "Only really weak guys can't be friends with girls."

"I'm just sayin', any woman who has a guy as a good friend is either a tease, or living in denial."

She rolls her eyes playfully, not really taking his words to heart. She snatches up her tubes of blood and the corresponding chart, announcing dryly, "I gotta get these to the lab."

"Think about it!"

Gracie just shakes her head as she makes her way out into the hall. She drops her samples off at the lab before finding her way back to admit, arriving just in time to find Carter turning up behind the desk, with Roxanne at his side. Gracie has always genuinely liked Roxanne, an affable insurance broker, and it is for this reason that she smiles when Roxanne greets her. She has no reason to dislike her. "Hey, Gracie!" Roxanne exclaims. She is holding a section of the newspaper in her hands. "Would you ever live in a commune?"

Gracie blinks with confusion as she makes a note in the chart, and exchanges it for another. "What?" is all she can manage to say.

"There's an ad here for a communal vegetarian household."

Carter snatches the newspaper out of Roxanne's grasp, giving her a telltale look. "And I do enjoy steak, thank you," he says wryly.

"Now, John, let's not be picky."

"Looking for a new place to live, Carter?" Gracie asks conversationally, looking over Dr. Weaver's notes on her nineteen-year-old in Exam Three.

"Yeah..." Carter blows out a slow breath as he checks the board.

"John lost the RA job," Roxanne supplies helpfully.

_"What?"_

Carter doesn't look thrilled. Gracie can't blame him. After the legend that was the medical school's Halloween party, where he had been a resident advisor in the dorms, she would have been less than thrilled too, were she in his position. "You can thank Lucy for that," he sighs.

"I don't think it's necessarily _Lucy's_ fault —"

"Yeah, but she certainly didn't help."

"Oh, here's one," Roxanne announces suddenly, her gaze focused on the paper. She reads aloud, "Furnished apartment in old townhome, access to full kitchen, many amenities..."

Carter perks up. "That sounds promising."

Roxanne leans against the counter and replies, "Yeah, and not too far from the hospital... look, I can talk to my realtor and set up an appointment for you after work?"

"All right," Carter agrees with a bit of a smile. "See you later."

Gracie watches as he leans in to give Roxanne a quick kiss. "Bye," she tells him, and Gracie looks back to her chart awkwardly. She knows Roxanne has left when Carter joins her side and starts removing his coat.

"Yeah, I was up half the night packing. They want me out _today_."

"You wanna talk late nights?" Gracie quickly retorts, as if this were a challenge to see whose night was worse. "I'm about ready to staple a _seatbelt_ to the forehead of every teenager that comes in here."

Carter's bubbling with chuckles before she even finishes her sentence. "What happened?"

She taps the chart in her hand. "Nineteen-year-old, not wearing a seatbelt while riding in the car with his buddy. When they wrecked, the car folded around him." While he's looking at something on the computer and not at her, Carter is actively listening, and he winces at these words. "Unconscious, tubed, and no breath sounds of the right. I kid you not, the flight crew darted his chest three times, and he'd_ still_ drop his sats. He crumped in trauma. When they cracked his chest in the OR, _both_ of his lungs were destroyed. He's either gonna die, or be a veggie."

"Damn."

"Oh, and the driver? C1 fracture. Promptly told me to go fuck myself rather than touch him. But I whispered sweet nothings into his ear, he shut up pretty fast."

He shakes his head and turns to look at her. "Sounds magical," he says with a bit of amusement, watching as she makes a note in her chart.

Gracie snorts, all worked up. "I'm _tired_ of telling people to wear their seatbelt. They just don't listen. I give up. I'm on strike."

"Didn't Florence Nightingale have some kind of pledge?"

She leans in close to his side, catching a hint of his aftershave in the process. "By the way, ICU's backed up 'cause of my veggie kid." Carter groans, and Gracie chortles loudly as she takes off for another patient. His reply drifts over her shoulder in passing, and all she can do is smirk as she departs.

"Viva la strike."

Later, Gracie hears about a trauma that came in, involving two carpet installers covered in glue; but she's too caught up with a patient in radiology to come assist. As the rain dies down and morning pushes into afternoon, she admits an asthmatic and takes advantage of fifteen blissful minutes to head up to the cafeteria, grab some food, and call to check up on Oupa. When she finally returns to the department, she walks so fast that she nearly runs into a familiar form.

"Hey now —"

His hands press down on her shoulders to steady her, and she looks up to find a baby-faced, clean shaven Dr. Carter. Her jaw drops.

"Where'd Sasquatch go?" Gracie asks breathlessly.

Carter gives her an unamused look. "As with everything in my life today, I blame Lucy."

"Carpet glue?"

All he can do is nod, and Gracie laughs before sweeping around him. "That was smart," she says. She makes her way into the lounge, and he follows.

"How much longer are you on?"

"Off at five," Gracie replies absently, reaching into her locker and pulling out a blood glucose monitor. "One hour, twenty minutes, and thirty-six seconds to go."

He collapses on the couch and watches as she pricks her finger to test the sugar. "At least it's not a thirty-six hour shift."

"You'd have to bury me alive before I offered to take on a thirty-six hour shift."

"Bury you alive?"

"I hate the thought of it."

He crinkles his forehead with mixed amusement at her words, shakes his head and sighs. "Yeah, I wanted to sneak out of here a bit early, go look at that apartment; but I don't think I'm gonna be able to get out in time."

Gracie ponders his statement. She has thought about his housing search ever since Roxanne pointed it out this morning, but a part of her toils over mentioning anything about it at all. She's not sure why she's thinking about it — perhaps because now she considers him a friend, and she only wants to help. But another part of her wonders about Roxanne, and what that would mean if either of them thought this was a good idea. So she says nothing, instead focusing on her pending glucose reading. "Everything good?" Carter asks.

It was a decent reading. She shrugs and put her supplies back in her locker, saying, "Can't complain." He murmurs an assenting word, and it is this that drives her to bring up her thoughts. "Hey..." she begins almost too casually, her gut churning, "you know... if your search doesn't pan out... I mean, you know. We have a spare room at home. Actually, it's more like a fold-out couch in a creaky old lanai, but the price is right."

Carter watches her with a steady gaze and a small smile on his lips. He says, "We'll see."

She shuts her locker, shifting the conversation in a casual, natural way as she bustles toward the door. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go _personally_ thank Lucy for singlehandedly eliminating the threat of cryptids in our workplace."

And that is all that can be said.

Darkness had long since settled over Chicago by the time Gracie finally hears a knock at her front door. Having been home for hours, unable to sleep, exhaustion deep in her bones, she walks around now in a warm, hooded sweatshirt and pajama pants, surreptitiously straightening the living room of Oupa's many puzzle boxes. And when the sound comes, she hurries to the door before the caller resorts to ringing the doorbell, not wishing to wake her grandfather.

Standing on the front porch, is Carter.

She greets him with nothing more than an inquisitive look, wrapping her sweatshirt-clad arms around herself in an unconscious attempt to shield herself from the chilly wind outside. He takes a moment to state his purpose for visiting so late. But finally, he says it, more a question than a statement.

"Does your offer still stand?"

----


	8. the miracle worker

Hi everyone! Just wanted to make a note that anything written in Afrikaans should be taken with a grain of salt... I'm not excellent with foreign languages, but I like to include even rough translations to make the 'atmosphere' in a story. Also, I'm going back and editing minor discrepancies in past chapters, in case you're curious. More soon. Thanks for reading!

* * *

**THE MIRACLE WORKER****  
Christmas Eve 1998**

"You're awake?"

Gracie looks like a deer caught in headlights as she makes her way through the front door, sticky with sweat and cheeks flushed from her daily morning run. She hesitates in the doorway for a moment, gazing into a house dimly lit by the early light of 6am, then closes the door behind her. Carter is sitting at the kitchen table, a warm cup of coffee between his hands, the newspaper in front of him. She hadn't expected him to be up so early. She feels a little bit like a kid caught with their hand in the cookie jar, although she can't understand why — she has every right to go running at the crack of dawn; she has always done it. Still, she feels a little sheepish. "Carter," she says, stepping further into the foyer. "You scared me."

"Sorry. I'm on at seven."

"Oh." She comes to a halt in the kitchen doorway, realizing the full depth of what was taking place in the kitchen — finding her grandfather standing by the electric stove, with what seemed like a million pans resting over the burners. _"Oupa!"_ Gracie exclaims, in what seems like shock more than anything, and Carter takes a sip of his coffee and watches as she enters the kitchen, stepping over Oupa's long trail of oxygen tubing in order to reach him. _"Wat doen jy?"_

Oupa, who had been frying homemade sausages in oil, turns to look at his granddaughter, replying in a croaky old voice, _"Wat lyk dit soos?"_

Gracie rolls her eyes, unable to think of any other response. She kisses the top of his head, albeit reluctantly, then moves to sit down across the table from Carter. "I see Oupa's been force-feeding you," she says, noting the half eaten plate of food next to the newspaper: eggs, fresh bread, creamy salted butter, thick cuts of back bacon, plump sweet tomatoes, and the aforementioned sausages. It's been quite a while since she's seen her grandfather cook up a storm in the kitchen, and she is so disconcerted that she can't decide whether to be pleased or concerned.

"Yeah," Carter laughs, shaking his head. He glances down at his plate and admits, "This language barrier is rough, I can't understand a word he says. He kept pushing the plate toward me and saying _ontbyt, ontbyt!_ And I was just like, all right... he really can't understand English?"

"Not well. He can't speak it to save his life, but he understands a bit of it. It's harder for him, though, as he gets older. The sicker he gets, the more he loses."

He nods sagely, then points to the sausages on his plate. "What're these called?"

"_Boerewors_. It's a traditional recipe."

"And he... made them himself?"

"He always makes them himself."

Carter murmurs, as if the mysteries of the universe have just been solved. It's quiet for a moment, then he says, "They're excellent. How do I say they're excellent?"

"_Hulle is uitstekend_."

Oupa is shuffling up to the table then, a cup of Gracie's usual tea in his grasp. She thanks him, and Carter repeats the phrase he has just been told, pointing to his plate and stumbling over the words badly. Gracie can't help but stifle a smile behind her teacup, taking a sip in an attempt at disguise. Oupa chuckles, and tells Carter, "_Dankie_," before shuffling back to the stovetop.

Carter gives Gracie a bit of a playful glance, as if accusing her of setting him up to fail at pronunciation. "I'd better get going," he says, taking one last sip of his coffee before rising from his seat. "Are you on today?"

She purses her lips and envelopes the outside of her teacup with her hands. "Actually, no," she says, almost a bit surprised herself. "For once."

He grabs his coat. "You two doing anything special?"

"What? Why?"

Carter chuckles a bit as he slips his coat on, his grin wide and nearly disbelieving as he replies, "It's Christmas Eve?"

Gracie blinks. "Oh." She takes a moment to continue, "No, we're never very spectacular around here. Christmas isn't how it used to be."

"That's pretty cynical."

"No, it's the truth. Christmas back home was all summer, no snow, pine branches decorating the house, and hanging up stockings by the bed on Christmas Eve for Father Christmas to put presents in." Gracie shrugs, sipping her tea. "Now, we just have dinner, watch a little television, go to bed."

Carter watches her with a steady gaze. "I'm sorry."

"Nah, it's okay. The only good thing about Christmas was the candy canes, anyway."

"I could cancel on my family —"

Gracie scrunches up her features, looking mildly offended at his suggestion. She says, "God, no, Carter. Don't you dare. Family is the most important thing we have." Another sip of her tea.

Carter says nothing for a moment. "All right, I gotta go. I'll catch you later."

_"Geseënde Kersfees!,"_ Oupa calls on his way out.

Much later, when the skies have dimmed and snow is imminent, Carter will return, slipping into a blackened home. He will lock up behind himself, and ease quietly through the house until he finds himself in the bedroom of a deeply sleeping Gracie. He'll watch her sleep before gently laying a candy cane on her pillow.

He will slip out of the room, just as quietly.

----


	9. the storm

**THE STORM  
February 1999**

"Africa, there you are!"

She screws up her features at Conni's greeting, bustling into the admit area with a bit of an apologetic air. "I know, I know, I'm late—"

"Like anyone even noticed?" Randi grumbles in her usual way.

Gracie loosens the scarf around her neck, glancing around with an air of confusion. Admit seems placid, almost hazy with the appearance of inaction. The night shift is officially on the clock, but at the moment it feels like nobody's on schedule. "Where is everyone?" Gracie asks. She isn't sure she wants to know.

"School bus versus snow plow," Randi sing-songs.

"Oh, God—"

Conni is gathering her things, preparing to clock out, and she sweeps by as she gathers her things, placing a hand on Gracie's shoulder as she goes. "Don't worry girl, I covered for you; but now I am off...bye, all—"

"How bad?" Gracie asks Randi almost breathlessly, brushing the dusting of snowflakes off the shoulders of her coat. Randi chuckles.

"You won't be happy."

Gracie's disdain for this kind of trauma was notorious. The younger the victims, the more agitated she got. She did her job, and did it well, but Gracie was never happy to work a severe pediatric trauma. She wasn't sure anyone was.

Randi adds on an afterthought, holding out a piece of paper, "Oh, and Dr. Carter asked me to give you this."

It's a prescription for _Naptime : TID : PRN_, scrawled out in Carter's familiar handwriting. Gracie rolls her eyes and can't help but laugh as she shrugs off her coat. She stares thoughtfully at the written words, thinking about the conversation she and Carter had earlier that provoked the Rx. Staying up until ungodly hours taking care of Oupa is beginning to become the norm for Gracie, and Carter feels that she is running herself a little too ragged.

"This is going to interact with my previous prescription."

"Previous?"

It takes a minute for Gracie to realize that Randi has no way of looking back on the past with her. She pauses, chuckles, and explains, "One day, back when Carter and I were still... feuding, I guess you could say—"

Chuny, just passing by, snorts. "Shut up," Gracie says immediately, turning to point at her before going on with her story. She continues, "Anyway, he wrote me a script for _Bitchstop : maximum dose : repeat for infinity_."

"I remember that!" Chuny chortles as she checks her labs. "You nearly killed him in front of Anspaugh!"

"I would have gotten written up, but Anspaugh just told him to stop antagonizing the Africans."

"_Would_ have?" Chuny points out a bit amusedly, "What are you talking about, Gracie, you've always been Anspaugh's pet."

"I have not!"

Chuny began mimicking Anspaugh's voice. "Oh, Ms. Abrahams, if you have a moment, I'd like to discuss with you the finer points of the emergency care system in South Africa, only if you have a moment, of course—"

"And I told him that it might seem like we do, but ER nurses never have a free moment."

"Sure."

Suddenly, Malik shows up. "Hey, ladies, if you don't mind, we're gettin' swamped out here!"

That was the shotgun at the races.

It was only later, much later, when things had died down and Gracie felt certain she would never be able to feel her legs again, that the weight of the evening became clear. She found Doug Ross out in the ambulance bay.

He looked like he was on his way out, but he stood there with an indescribable expression on his face, as if he were reminiscing about times past.

"Hey, kid," Doug greeted her, a bit glumly.

Gracie wrapped her cardigan tighter around her form, ambling up to where he stood. "Hey, boss," she replied softly. She was trying to be sensitive to the situation at hand: Ricky Abbott had died, and now Doug was facing criminal charges. She'd heard through the grapevine that he had resigned, and even though it was probably for the best, she couldn't help but feel sadness. Doug was a friend. "Didn't think I'd let you get away without saying goodbye?"

"Oh, you had time, I'm in no hurry."

"No hurry? I'm shocked," Gracie said dryly, leaning against a wall.

"First time for everything."

It was quiet; for how long, she was unsure. It seemed like too long, even though in reality it was a few mere moments. But finally, Doug stuffed his hands into his pockets, licked his lips like he had something important to say, and continued with a clearing of the throat, "Hey, Africa, uh—" He paused. "I'm not the best person to be taking advice from. But, ah... don't let a good thing slip away."

Gracie rose an eyebrow; she was clearly confused. But all he did was pull a hand out of his pocket, affectionately pat her on the forearm, and say, "I'll see ya."

With that, he left.

--


	10. point of origin

**POINT OF ORIGIN  
April 1999**

Gracie has always been ambivalent about April Fool's Day, and she feels this way even now, as she wanders out of the lounge with a cup of tea. Two hours into her shift and this feeling has not changed. For her, there is always something to either love or loathe about working on this day — to loathe, the overabundance of practical jokes played on herself; to love, the sheer multitude of crazies being triaged. She can truly count herself among the ranks of masochistic emergency room nurses, and she knows this with a certain self-satisfaction.

She wearily enters admit just as a fight breaks out in triage. Security swarms the offenders, and she stands next to Jerry, watching with a mildly blank, indifferent look as she sips from her mug. He glances over at her and exuberantly remarks with a bit of a smirk, "The natives are restless!"

Before she can get out a good, hearty chuckle, Carter makes his presence known, his familiar voice filtering over her shoulder, "Send Africa. She knows all about interacting with the natives."

Gracie spins on one heel to glare at the lanky doctor. He grins.

"How about no," she states simply, "how does no sound to you?"

"Sounds like my subordinate is disregarding me."

She coughs with mocking disgust. Today, Carter is Senior for the day, essentially leaving him in charge of the ER's operations — a stepping stone to becoming Chief Resident. She has jokingly complained since clocking in, and will continue to do so until shift change, but Carter takes the ribbing in stride. "Dream big, Carter," she says, disguising a yawn with another sip of her tea. "Dream big."

She isn't successful, though. His expression is immediately one of concern, his brows knitting together as she picks up one of her charts, while the fight behind them is broken up by security. She cradles her mug in one hand while she flips through the chart with the other, and he watches. After a moment, he says nonchalantly, "Did you get any sleep last night?"

Gracie responds, a little too quickly. She does not look at him. "Sure."

He doesn't believe her. "You were awake when I got up this morning."

She rolls her eyes. "Nothing gets past you, does it?"

"Your sarcasm is _such_ a turn-on."

Jerry turns away as if he isn't eavesdropping, but Gracie knows better. She shoots Carter a warning glance, and he grins.

She states dryly, "You are walking a fine line, John. Meth-addicted paranoiacs won't even compare to what'll be waiting for you."

"Oupa's worse, isn't he."

Gracie is taken aback by this sudden change of subject. She pauses, with her mug halfway to her lips, her gaze tilted in his direction from under dark eyelashes. He has never seen her look so tired, never seen that particular shade of deep violet beneath her eyes, never thought so confidently that she was finding herself a downward spiral. Last night, he hadn't gotten home until very late, and had gone straight to bed, expecting that she would soon do the same — it hadn't occurred to him that might have not been the case. She bites her lip and nods.

"I sat up all night with him," she says quietly, looking away with what seemed like shame. She sips her tea, and Carter fills with empathy. Oupa — who suffers from COPD as a result of an alpha1-antitrypsin deficiency — has been decompensating steadily over the past month. He spends more time in bed, a home nurse visits more frequently, and Gracie takes it upon herself to watch over him more consistently. This revelation makes it clear to him that Gracie has, quite literally, been awake for the past twenty-four hours.

And, as always, Carter steps in.

He is quiet for a moment, then nods simply, mind made. "Okay," he says plainly, "Jerry?" The stout desk clerk gives him his attention. "Gracie's going to go take a nap in Exam Three."

Gracie snorts, "Don't be silly, John, I'm fine."

"Whatever you say, boss," Jerry shakes his head.

"I'm not taking a nap!"

Carter raises an eyebrow. "We can do it the easy way, or the hard way."

She glares at him for the longest time. She thinks of all the reasons why she couldn't possibly give in to his demand, consistently coming up empty-handed — and this fills her with even more annoyance. Here, though, she gives in.

A sigh, an irritated glance. She sweeps around the admit desk, mug in hand, and leaves. Carter watches her disappear into Exam Three.

It's quiet for a moment, until Jerry clears his throat. "So..."

He gives Carter a pointed look.

"I don't wanna hear it, Jer."

--


	11. power

Just wanted to say thanks if you're reading... enjoy :)**  
**

* * *

**POWER****  
May 1999**

It's spring.

This fact has never been more obvious. She sees it everywhere: in the subtle, humid breeze of early afternoon, in the rolling power outages all over town, in the overabundance of patients complaining of allergies in triage. For this is where she sits, covering triage a bit grudgingly (reminding herself that there's no 'i' in 'team'), when an agitated young woman comes rushing up to the desk.

"I can't breathe," the woman exclaims raspily, interspersing her words with frantic, dry coughs, "my throat is closing; I need a shot of epi!"

Gracie's mildly morose mood was cast aside as she peered over her shoulder in search of someone. Her eyes land on Mark Greene, and her mind is settled as she circles the counter and places a hand on the woman's shoulder, calling so Mark can hear, "Dr. Greene, I've got respiratory distress over here!"

She calmly rushes the woman into the hands of Mark and Lydia, and sticks with the case long enough to officially start a chart before heading back to her post. She's making her way down the hall to admit when her mood returns, and it's something Carter picks up on as she swings past him and eases herself into a chair. He asks, "Oupa doing okay with these dropouts?"

Gracie rolls her eyes and makes a few notes in a chart, acutely aware of the fact that he has abandoned his work on the computer to look her way. "We're on priority usage with the electric company, he should be fine. Plus, you know, our neighbor Carl's right next door, he comes over and spends time with him when the home nurse isn't there..." She pauses, as if she isn't sure. "He's fine."

She's quiet for a moment, then apparently rescinds her comment, "Actually, I just... I don't think he's going to make it to Christmas." Her words may have seemed out of context for the question, but Carter understood completely.

"You wanna take a lunch later and go check on him?"

She gives him a bit of an incredulous look. "We're pretty busy, John."

He looks sheepish. "Yeah, I know, I just thought—"

Jerry interrupts. "Hey, Carter, UPS still hasn't shown, you want me to call them?"

"Yeah, would you?" Carter replies absently, without taking his eyes off Gracie. Her expression went from mildly distracted to a bit sour. "What?"

"I hate Mother's Day," Gracie grumbles. He suddenly understands.

"I'm sorry," he says quietly. He knew her mother had died when she was sixteen, but they had never really gotten into the specifics. It was a touchy subject.

She laughs, the shaky, uncertain kind, and she attempts to disguise it by focusing on charts — but Carter takes note. "Yeah, well," she says, "that's breast cancer for you, right?"

He's quiet for a moment, mulling over her response, before announcing, "You know what makes everything better? Bacon."

Gracie gives him a bewildered look. He continues, drawing out his words as if trying to talk her into something, "A chicken club on wheat... Doc's uses a lot of bacon..."

"Really, John, that's sweet, but there's a lot of work to do."

He's reluctant to walk away, but there are patients waiting. "Well... don't say I didn't ask."

"Wouldn't dream of it."

The eruption of a thunderstorm outside brings with it concern over a rapist roaming the hospital dressed as an employee, and Gracie is on her guard. She absently asks Lydia when she passes by about the woman with respiratory distress, and learns that the woman had been eating a salad at a luncheon when she started to have an allergic reaction, despite not being obviously allergic to anything in the dish. She had forgotten her epi pen at home, and had decided to drive herself to the ER rather than call an ambulance, despite living far enough away that she would have become a danger to others on the road had her airway closed. Gracie had no time to marvel over the ridiculousness of society, for just as this information was relayed, the power failed.

When the hospital had to switch to auxiliary power, her triage duties were abandoned to assist with disaster protocol: i.e., ensuring that all critical devices had power. She found herself roaming the halls with a flashlight in hand, checking on patients, but it's not long before the backup generator fails. She is sitting in Curtain Area Two with an unconscious male, using one hand to bag him in place of a vent while using the other to attempt dialing a nearby phone, when Carter suddenly appears, a mini-flashlight in hand. He shines it over her face, and she winces.

"Sorry," he says, diverting the light to shine over the keypad of the phone. "I hate to break it to you, but it's pointless. Nobody can get an outside line."

Gracie groans and hangs up. "It was worth a shot," she says, turning her attention back to bagging. She seems to need to talk in order to keep herself distracted. "He's got oxygen tanks," she says, almost like she's reassuring herself, "he'll be fine, right?"

He doesn't answer at first, but then says, "I broke up with Roxanne."

Her eyes dart to his. She seems surprised, but mildly sympathetic, saying, "Oh, John, I'm sorry..." trailing off as if she doesn't know what else to say.

In this light, she is beautiful. Those honey brown tresses falling in her eyes, flashlight-created shadows casted against her skin. She looks the same as she always does — pink scrubs, a black, longsleeved t-shirt underneath, tennis shoes — and he's not sure why he does it, but at the moment it feels right.

He steps forward, lowers his shoulders, and gently presses his lips to hers.

--


	12. last rites

**LAST RITES  
October 1999**

"I'm not a drug seeker," the man insisted from the bed of Curtain Area One, "I have a real problem that needs medication!"

Gracie sighs. Her first patient of the shift, after three days off, and she is blessed with this. She would have simply gone with the motions; she is used to this type of patient and knows the protocol well. But charting the bullshit complaint, keeping in the back of her mind that sometimes crackheads really are sick, only serves as a means to an end: she notes the doctor's name signed to the chart.

Malucci.

She freezes. Her crackhead is babbling away, but Gracie doesn't hear any of it . Her chest feels heavy, and she's not certain whether she is angry or afraid. "I'll see if the doctor will order some toradol," she says, a bit dazed, turning on one foot and beginning to walk away, completely unaware of her surroundings.

"I'm allergic to toradol!" Her crackhead yells. He goes ignored.

She wanders to admit, where she finds Carter. He looks up at her sudden presence, and his happy reaction at her appearance is nothing reflective of the spontaneous kiss they had shared five months ago. They haven't discussed it since, a fact that neither is sure who initiated. It was as if nothing had happened.

And besides, Carter insisted he didn't date nurses, anyway.

"My drug seeker is allergic to toradol," she tells him quietly.

"Who's signed to the chart?"

But she doesn't get a chance to respond. A very familiar young man circles into admit, and stops, stethoscope looped around his neck, a shellshocked look on his face. Gracie didn't look so good, either. She wants to run away, but Malucci takes a step forward before she can. "I knew they said Abrahams, but I didn't wanna believe it."

"Go away, Dave," Gracie manages to croak, and Carter finally straightens, looking to each one and back again with raised eyebrows.

"You two know each other?"

"You're _living_ in Chicago?"

"I said go away."

"Is Oupa living with you, too?"

"Not like it matters to you, right?" Gracie spits viciously. Malucci shrinks down, looking like he doesn't know whether he wants to punch something or cry. He shifts gears quickly, the process of emotions plain on his face.

"You've got the guy in Curtain Area One?" Malucci asks nonchalantly, immediately reaching out for the chart in her hands and flipping through it.

She can't bring herself to reply, and instead stares at him. Carter glances to each of them with concern, and supplies helpfully, "He's a drug seeker, he won't take toradol."

"Nubain?"

"These guys usually want one thing."

Malucci shakes his head and makes a few notes in the chart, looking a little worse for the wear. "Tell him _no_ dilaudid, Gracie, and if he flips out, I'm ordering droperidol."

"That's pretty ballsy, Dave," Carter remarks. Gracie still says nothing.

"I'm just a ballsy kind of guy," Malucci coolly replies, shoving the chart back into Gracie's hands. He stares her down and points at her, insisting, "We're going to talk about this later."

And then he leaves.

It takes a few moments for them to snap back into the living, what with the awkward tension hanging in the air. Carter watches her for a few minutes, until finally asking the question that is dying to escape from his lips. "How do you know Dr. Dave?"

Gracie glances up at Carter, as if just realizing that he is still there. It seems to take a moment for her brain to process his question, and when she actually answers it is almost difficult to believe.

"He's my brother."

She leaves before Carter can pry anymore, leaving behind a surprised and confused John. She spent much of the day attempting to avoid either of them, mostly babysitting her drug seeker after Malucci ordered some tedious tests. She tried twice to place a number twenty-four IV in her patient's thumb, but failed, and when she obtained an IM order for toradol, her attempts were thwarted.

"I _told_ you, I can't take that! What about dilaudid?"

The drug seeker was plainly agitated.

"Dr. Malucci is aware of your request," Gracie sighs diplomatically, hardly believing that she is even using the name, "and he will not order dilaudid."

"What about demerol?"

"It's either this, or nubain."

"You've _gotta_ be kidding me!"

"Look, you're lucky he's not holding meds until the tests come back!" Gracie snaps as she charts the patient's 'request.' But it doesn't help — Drug Seeker begins flailing in bed, screaming for a new nurse.

She barely has enough time to jump back and call for security before Malucci comes running over from admit. She is vaguely aware of the paramedics bringing in someone in the background, and Carter following the convoy to Trauma One, but all of her attention is focused on the fact that her estranged brother is pinning an agitated man to a hospital gurney in front of her. Security is running over to help, and Malucci commands, "Gracie, five milligrams droperidol, IM."

"No! No! No!" Drug Seeker shouts endlessly, and Gracie operates more on fury than anything as she rushes to fufill Malucci's request. They are bundling the man into four-point restraints when she returns, syringe in hand. She injects the medication intramuscularly, and suddenly everyone relaxes and steps aside to let him scream it out into sedation. Gracie inhales deeply; it's almost difficult to breathe.

He's watching her. He asks point-blank, "Why didn't you tell me?"

She doesn't reply at first. Catching her breath, she stares back before retorting, "Why did you leave?"

Neither had a response for the other.

"Um, Gracie—"

They are interrupted by Lydia, who looks uncomfortable to be cutting in.

"Carter's asking for you in Trauma One."

That was unusual. It wasn't typical for a doc to be requesting another nurse when the trauma team was already complete. But Gracie figures he just needs help, and she goes willingly, barely paying attention to the fact that Malucci is following her. What greets her is her worst nightmare.

Oupa is on the gurney, in the middle of all the action. He is flanked by nurses she knows well, machines and tubing she could put together in her sleep. Carter is running the trauma, and suddenly everything makes sense. None of this should have been unexpected, but Gracie doesn't feel prepared. She senses Malucci freeze in the doorway behind her, equally unprepared. Her inability to move her legs is obvious, and Carter gives her an inexplicable look, looping his stethoscope around his neck and crossing the room in three large steps.

His voice is soft and sympathetic, and he speaks slowly, like it will help her to understand. "Carl found him on the porch," he said gently, "We just ran a blood gas, but he's cyanotic and confused. He's satting 78 on room air. He—"

She knew what it meant. He was going into respiratory failure.

Carter continues softly, "I need you to translate for him."

It takes all the effort in the world for Gracie to step forward, to stand near Oupa's head and gently smooth back his hair. She whispers, _"Shh, Oupa. Ek is hier. Alles is fyn,"_ and quietly asks someone for the priest on call. Carter runs a hand through his hair, looking helpless, while Malucci watches the scene with palpable shock, catching drifts of the language he had nearly forgotten.

_"Ons Vader wat in die hemel is,"_ she murmurs, gently stroking her grandfather's hair. She can see him struggling to mouth the words behind the confines of an oxygen mask, and it breaks her heart. _"Laat u Naam geheilig word; laat u koninkryk kom; laat u wil ook op die aarde geskied, net soos in die hemel."_

He will pass shortly after the arrival of the priest, and Gracie will find herself on the floor of the trauma room in tears, only to be escorted out in the arms of an estranged brother. Malucci will sink to the floor of the hallway with her in reach and say the only words he can possibly think of as she shamelessly cries into his shoulder,

"_Ek is jammer_. I love you. I'm so sorry."

--


	13. greene with envy

**GREENE WITH ENVY  
October 1999**

It's raining.

Fat, wet drops that hit the pavement with hearty splatters. A shower that Gracie finds appropriate for the day. She stands in the middle of it unabashedly, hands shoved into the pockets of her moisture-covered coat, face tilted up toward the heavens, and Malucci watches her from the stoop of the ambulance bay. He doesn't know how long he has been standing here. He feels much like the older brother he has suppressed for so long, solicitous and watchful. The fact that he has been unable to curb her tears is what kills him most.

Her awareness of his presence isn't obvious until she calls over the downpour, "I'm not generally thought of as insane..." A thoughtful pause, as she teeters slowly around in a circle. "But today, I woke up feeling a little crazy."

Malucci blinks and crosses his arms. He returns not unkindly, "You've always been crazy."

She laughs, face pointed to the sky, streaked with wetness. And he is concerned, finding himself amazed at how quickly he can feel this way after their being separated for so long. This is a Gracie in mourning.

"Are you sure you want to do this, Gracie?" Malucci calls after a moment of quiet. His tone is reluctant. He does not know what else to say.

Gracie pauses, finally peering at him from eye level, looking much like a drowned rat. "I have to, Dave," she says dispassionately. And so it was.

She plans on using up some vacation time, on heading home to South Africa for a while. Gracie said that it was purely to take Oupa back home for burial, but Malucci knows better. She wants to disappear. To think.

He had learned quickly of Carter's displeasure at the idea. It's obvious even now, as Carter wanders through the doors and out onto the stoop, his discontent plain on his face. Carter stands on Malucci's left side, a closed umbrella in hand. He eyes Gracie, who looks back at him impetuously.

"You should go get something dry," Carter remarks to her.

"I'll change at the airport."

Malucci watches quietly as they stare each other down, until finally Carter replies with an air of stoicism, "You ready to go, then?"

Gracie says nothing, but her agreement is plain. Carter opens his umbrella and steps out into the rain, covered by the shield. He steps out to her, holding the umbrella over her head. With one long, last look at her brother, Gracie walks away, side by side. They head in the direction of the parking garage, where Carter's Jeep was waiting with her luggage in the backseat, and as they leave, Malucci swears he can see Carter's arm snake around the waist of his baby sister.

"Malucci! Trauma coming in!"

He stares after the pair for one more moment before whipping around and yelling back as he ventures inside, "How many times do I have to tell you! It's Dr. Dave!"

--


	14. be still my heart & all in the family

**BE STILL MY HEART/ALL IN THE FAMILY  
Valentine's Day 2000**

The sun has yet to rise, and yet she stands here, peering out the window onto a darkened Chicago street. She is quiet. Thoughtful. She wears nothing but one of his white dress shirts, buttoned up to the bust and wrinkled from previous use. All that echoes in here are the quiet, gentle sounds of breaths expelled from the body in her bed, and it is enough to make her think she is alone with her thoughts. She rests her head against the window, and sighs.

She is so caught up in contemplation, that she doesn't hear the creaking of bedsprings. She only becomes aware of footsteps approaching her from behind, and she does not react when familiar, capable hands touch her waist and a gentle mouth presses a kiss to the nape of her neck.

"What's the matter?" he asks quietly, nuzzling his nose into her hair.

She does not know how to respond.

It has been months. Months since arriving home, two days after Christmas, although Gracie wasn't sure if she would ever regain the feeling of home again. She has since fallen back into routine, working frequent shifts to distract herself from the silence that hangs so heavily over this place now. She was slowly making up for years of lost time with her brother. And any questions Malucci peppered her with about the man who stood behind her now, were verily ignored.

And it wasn't the slow, steady churning of change that plagued her thoughts now. It was _who_ that slow steadiness was choosing to occur with.

Last night had been the first time.

How does one embrace change? Gracie acknowledges it with an air of confusion, wondering just where it was coming from when it had been creeping up all along. It had been for years, although she wasn't certain she was ready to admit it. Confusion met with reluctant acceptance, a wary bystander returning what is given. Inquisitive kisses had been met with caution, making way for shortness of breath and hands laying streaks of heat in their path. She wasn't ready.

She wasn't prepared to push him away, either.

"I wish I knew," she mutters, even though she already has a vague idea. She leans backward into his embrace, resting the back of her head against his shoulder, tilting it just far enough to the side to meet his lips coming into contact with her forehead. He murmurs absently, no real intelligible words to be found. He grips her hips a bit tighter, deeply inhales the scent of her hair.

And he asks, "Do you want the shower first?"

All she can do is nod.

Later, when the sun has risen and both have found their way to County, Gracie finds herself staring into a gaping neck wound, and listening to a conversation she wants nothing to do with.

"I'm tellin' you, man — five a.m. That's the time, man, it's, I mean, that's when you _feel_ it, man, and the pussy is so good it don't matter if she looks like a dog..."

Malucci is chortling. He's scribbling in a chart as Gracie snaps on a pair of latex gloves, checks the flow of the banana bag that this guy was hooked up to, and proceeds to prod a gloved finger around the hole in his neck. He's so doped up after his all-night drinking binge (that resulted in a meeting of a piece of rebar with neck) that he doesn't even feel it. "Listen to this kid," Malucci laughs, "Five a.m. I'll leave you to drinking at five in the morning, I'll take seven a.m. and the hot girl."

"Seven a.m., man, you're crazy..." Drunk Guy seems to reconsider his words, peering over at Gracie as she works. "You, though, you're lookin' pretty good..."

Gracie quirks a brow, "How about never? Is never good for you?"

"C'mon! It's Valentine's Day!"

"Don't even get me started on that," Gracie grumbles, and her feelings about the day are starting to show. Drunk Guy peers at Malucci.

"Girls with accents are good fucks, man, right?"

"Hey, watch it, that's my baby sister you're talking about."

"Oh, _now_ you're defending my honor?"

Malucci simply seems amused by this whole situation. He gazes at her across the gurney, laughing as she began to irrigate the wound. "I always defend your honor! What is this, some _Princess Bride_ shit?"

She shoots him a patented glare across their patient. The next time Drunk Guy speaks, he refers his question to Malucci. "What's her problem, man?"

Her brother eyes her with a certain expression, the kind that suggested he was on to her, whatever that may be. "She got laid last night, I think."

Gracie withdraws immediately, dropping her syringe down on a nearby tray and snapping off her gloves with an annoyed air. Drunk Guy is nodding sagely, while Malucci watches her with a mildly tickled expression.

"Baby, I coulda told you that," their patient mused. "You don't fuck someone the day before Valentine's Day, man, it don't become a fuck after that—"

"Oh?" Gracie slaps her dirtied gloves down on the steel tray. "What does it become?"

"It becomes a chore."

She laughs, but it's the frustrated, annoyed kind that you expect to hear out of one who feels they have too much on their plate. "Dave, I'm done, get Yosh to help you."

"He's too busy passing out cards — aw, c'mon, Gracie!"

But she's already too busy walking away.

"Women," Drunk Guy shakes his head.

Her storming down the hall does not go unnoticed, and as she bustles into the empty lounge she finds Carter two steps behind her. He asks her what's wrong, and she's spewing words out of her mouth faster than she can think.

"Who else is talking about us?"

He seems surprised. "Malik, I think..."

It's apparently the wrong answer. She laughs sardonically, pacing back and forth, hands shaking slightly. "What is this, a male thing?"

"Gracie, what are you talking about?"

"What are we doing, John?"

Carter steps forward. "Hey, c'mon," he says, trying to sound soothing. He catches her by the shoulders and tries to peer down to meet her eye line. "Calm down. All of this, it's nothing, you know that, right?"

"Is it?"

He watches her quietly, a distinctly serious look that suggests there is something more to be said. "I like you, Gracie," he says simply.

She says nothing.

"And we can't fight this."

With those words, he presses a lingering kiss to her forehead and says, "Come find me when you're ready to talk." Then he leaves.

She will find herself standing there for the longest time, staring into nothing and wondering why she can't bring herself to understand the turn her life is taking, until Conni enters the lounge and gives her a sly look. Gracie leaves quickly.

Much later, when the staff's usual holiday party is in full swing, Gracie finds herself strolling sluggishly into a barrage of glittery red hearts and streamers. She throws a chart down into a pile on the counter, and Chuny shoves a piece of pizza into her hand, but she can barely get two bites into it before Malucci is tearing her away for a dance. She drops her slice on a plate and is whisked away, his hand resting securely on the small of her back while the other holds on to her own. She struggles for a moment to keep up, and she barely has enough time to glare at him for the sudden interruption before he tells her matter-of-factly, "My seventy-year-old war vet threatened to flip me over a balcony."

"Good."

He sways with her exaggeratedly, and she complies with the air of a little sister thoroughly annoyed with her sibling. "So are you ever going to tell me what's up with you and Carter?"

"No."

"Just no?"

She rolls her eyes and glances around. Everyone seems to be having a good time, staff fluttering in and out of the admit area to partake in merriment between patients. Malucci licks his lips with obvious amusement, opens his mouth while glancing to his side at nothing in particular, and says, "Look, as your brother, let me give you some advice—"

"You don't really have that luxury," Gracie interrupts.

Malucci stares at her, the second most serious look she's seen all day. "I wish you would let me."

She returns his gaze for an unblinking moment, then shrugs and looks away. He says quietly, "Carter's good for you, Gracie. I've seen how you are with him."

"Just like how Mum and Dad were together?"

"That's different, and you know it."

Their dancing begins to falter as she hisses, "He _left_ us, Dave. And then he died and you came back to us, only to leave just like _he_ did. How can your word mean anything serious to me?"

He doesn't know how to respond.

A scream comes from down the hall, and the two tear apart in surprise. A couple of others peek down the corridor to check on the commotion, as nothing about it sounds good. And suddenly, Gracie finds herself caught up in a whirlwind. The scream had come from Weaver, people were rushing down to Curtain Area Three, all hell was breaking loose — someone was hurt. Lucy? No, it couldn't be. It was too shocking to believe. But then someone mentions Carter, and Gracie takes off running to the trauma rooms, where two people have just been carried in.

Lucy is in one room, drenched in blood. She seems to have been stabbed. Malucci's already in there with Weaver and a plethora of others, and the minute he spots Gracie angling herself towards the other trauma room, he calls after her, "Gracie, honey, no, you don't wanna do that..."

But she ignores him, pushing past the flapping doors. She has to see for herself. What she finds causes the breath to be knocked out of her.

Carter is on the gurney, surrounded by Chen and Kovac and others, unconscious and pale with blood loss. Red stains soak his shirt, and Gracie is shaking, one hand trembling over her mouth, because all she can think of is the last words she'd said to him. How she felt this sudden, overwhelming terror at the thought that his life hung in the balance.

Lydia attempts to guide her out of the room, but Gracie refuses. "No," she says, her voice cracking with upset, "I wanna help."

Kovac peers up at her, stethoscope still in his ears as he listens to Carter's heart. "Please, Luka," Gracie pleads, "Let me help."

He says nothing at first, too caught up in the flurry of activity taking place over Carter's unconscious body. Then, "Go call the blood bank, Gracie."

She is exiled.

She runs from the room just in time to feel her whole body shake violently, and she finds herself rushing to the nearest trash can to throw up inside. She sobs, throat full of acidic bile, snot dripping from her nose as she coughs up vomit. After a moment, when she feels nothing more can come up, she hovers over the can with her hands bracing the sides. Her cheeks are red and tear-streaked.

Keep breathing, she tells herself. Just keep breathing.

She straightens, wipes her mouth with her sleeve, and picks up the nearest phone.

--


	15. be patient

**BE PATIENT  
February 2000**

She isn't sure what to expect.

It's not that she hasn't wanted to see him. She has. She's spent every waking moment fretting over his condition. It's that she was afraid of what she might find.

Many have tried to tell her. "It's important," her brother had said, "you may never regret anything more."

But knowing and doing are two very different things.

So when she finally finds the strength, the _courage_, to venture upstairs... it is terrifying in a very real way. She arrives on the tail-end of a shift, as the sunset pours beams of orange and red through the hospital windows. She wears a very light, dark grey cardigan over her requisite pink nursing scrubs, her tennis shoes squeaking against the floor as she makes her way down the hall.

People came to see him all the time — she knows, because they know everyone who works here. She hears from them constantly. "He looks really good," they say, "he's doing very well."

It is hard to reconcile the image of a healthy man with the one that runs constantly through her mind: him, laying lifeless in the trauma room, pale and bloodied. When she comes to stand in his doorway, she tries. But there is too much emotion welling up in the base of her throat.

He is propped up in bed, in a hospital gown and pajama pants, a robe to keep him warm. He looks tired, but his eyes soften at the sight of her, as if her unannounced visit came at very long last. "Gracie," he murmurs, beckoning her with one hand; come in, come closer. It is not quick enough to quell her emotion, the sob that bubbles forth in her throat as she perches on the edge of the bed and buries her face in his shoulder, but he knows. He understands. She had bottled everything up inside since the stabbing, and it was choosing now to emerge.

But he did look good. He looked healthier and well cared for. Physical therapy was treating him well.

"I'm sorry," Gracie stammers between tears, but she is shushed in response, his hand snaking upward to gently stroke her hair. He tilts his head, closes his eyes and inhales deeply, the scent of her lavender shampoo filling his nostrils. "I should have come sooner... I don't know, I—"

"Shh, it's okay. I understand why you didn't."

It took a moment for her to catch her breath, to draw herself back, to sniffle and glance him over with indescribable eyes. He watches her quietly, reaches out for her, but she snatches her arm away. Her hands are trembling slightly, and suddenly her gaze is focused on anything but him. "I'm okay," he says quietly.

She nods, but he isn't positive his reassurance is getting through. "Really," he continues in an almost rambling sort of way, "I should be getting out soon, I'll be back to work in a couple weeks; and I know we haven't talked about it, but I really think that I should maybe move in with my grandmother for the time being, and... why are you upset?"

And she says nothing for the longest time. Until she speaks, and it is so soft he has to strain to hear. She says, "John, I was terrified. _Terrified_. I have never felt that kind of pure, unadulterated fear in my life. Not until I met you."

A pause, as she slowly peers up at him from under long eyelashes. "Not until I had the possibility of losing you."

He somehow finds the voice to ask, "And that scares you?"

"More than anything."

Silence.

"You know, it's okay to be scared."

Silence. She still won't glance his way, but she looks exhausted. And after a moment, he simply sighs and motions for her to join his side, permitting enough room for her to lay next to him in the hospital bed. She acquiesces, burying herself in his chest with an arm around his waist, and they remain in perfect quietude. He ignores every little twinge of pain, for her. And much later, when she is fast asleep and a nurse comes to announce the end of visiting hours, he shoos the woman away just to keep the one sleeping peacefully at his side. For her.

"I was scared too," he whispers into her hair.

--


	16. such sweet sorrow

**SUCH SWEET SORROW  
May 2000**

"That just looks like tuberculosis waiting to happen."

She's a twenty-something drug addict, dirty and disheveled from the streets, sweaty and coughing with every twitching movement she makes. And Gracie finds herself standing in her doorway, hands on her hips while Carter peers over her shoulder. For a moment, Gracie's almost defensive of her addict. She shoots Carter a warning glance over her shoulder, steps into the room with a bag of saline in hand, and stands by the bedside as she hooks the bag up to an IV machine.

"What did he say?" Druggie girl stammers between coughs.

"Nothing," Gracie replies quickly, continuing to shoot glares over her shoulder as she hooks the IV up to her patient and injects something into the port on the bag. She increases the drip and pulls a few plastic tabs out of her scrub pocket, setting up a nebulizer treatment. "Dr. Carter, here, is very anxious to take care of you."

He's tired. She can see that. Those bags under his eyes have been in place for days, sleepless nights introduced by spring. She worries about him. She isn't able to so easily check on him now — no longer was he right down the hall from her, a motion she still can't really understand. He withdraws now. Takes and gives little in return. Exercises constantly, thinking he can accomplish everything, only to become progressively agitated. Gracie isn't sure what to think.

"John," Gracie says sharply, when Carter doesn't move.

He steps forward, saying nothing to the patient, merely slipping the buds of his stethoscope in his ears and listening to her breathing. "Temperature's 101.4," Gracie remarks quietly. He removes the buds and steps backward.

"Sounds like bronchitis," he says dully.

Gracie rolls her eyes, then turns to their patient. "Hannah," she says, addressing the addict by name. "What are you on?"

"What?"

"What are you _on_, Hannah?"

"I got nothin'."

"Show him your arms."

"What!"

"Show the doctor your arms, Hannah!"

Gracie helps the girl push up her sleeves, enough to reveal a large area of injection-site cellulitis around her right bicep. "It's just a little meth, is all," the girl says dismissively.

Carter blinks, hands Gracie the chart, and says, "You know the drill."

"I don't like him," Hannah exclaims between coughs, slurping up her nebulizer treatment as he makes a break for the door.

Gracie ignores her, but follows him, jogging to catch up. "You win more with honey than you do with vinegar, John," she tells him, albeit not too gently.

"You're one to talk."

"Will you just stop?"

"And do what?"

"Explain _this_ to me, explain to me what the hell's going on with you!"

He stops suddenly, and she nearly plows into him in the middle of the hall, almost like how Carol comes running into them a second later — her things gathered, looking like she's ready to run out the door. Gracie is momentarily distracted. "Where are _you_ going?" she calls after the black-haired nurse, as she recovers and poises to continue on her way.

"I gotta go see him; I'll be in touch..."

It takes a moment, while Carol is scurrying away, for Gracie to realize whom she was talking about. She is so caught up in the realization that Carter almost gets away. "John, please!" Gracie snatches him by the elbow, and he jerks so violently that she is shocked. She takes two steps back, a stunned look on her features.

Carter suddenly looks resigned. He pulls her into the drug lockup.

"There is _nothing_ wrong with me," he finally says when surrounded by quiet, and he looks as if he's struggling to be gentle. "I'm _fine_."

"Don't lie to me."

"Why would I lie to you about this?"

"Look, I know you're in pain, I _know_ it hurts, but—"

"But I'm fine!"

"What do you want me to do?" Carter looks annoyed as Gracie fights to latch on to something resembling hope. She pleads, "Do you want me to stay with you tonight? At Gamma's? Do you want me to go to therapy with you, hold your hand; what, John? What do you want? Tell me anything, and I'll _do_ it—"

He is quiet. He stares back at her with weary eyes, sighs, shakes his head. He steps forward and cradles her face in his hands. His skin feels a little rough, product of one too many years of handwashing procedures. His thumb trails gently across her bottom lip, and she finds herself briefly wondering why, after so many situations like this, they didn't consider themselves official. A kiss is pressed to her forehead, long and lingering.

And then he walks away.

She finds herself sliding down a cabinet to the floor, head to knees.

--


	17. may day

Well, here's the final chapter. For this part, at least. There is a sequel, entitled "The Difference," and it will be up shortly. If you enjoyed this story, please review, and join me at the new story!

* * *

**MAY DAY  
June 2000**

"I need to talk to you."

Gracie peers up from her charts to find Dr. Greene standing over her, flanked by Dr. Weaver. His expression is rather solemn, as if there was something very wrong, and for the briefest of moments, Gracie is deeply concerned. She lowers her pen, raises an eyebrow. "Is everything okay?" she asks, and Greene shakes his head.

"Not here," he says, motioning for her to follow. She rises from her chair dutifully, following Weaver and Greene towards an empty exam room, tennis shoes squeaking against the floor as she moves. They close the door behind them.

Greene sighs, crosses his arms, turning to face her but peering down at the floor as he does so. "Uh, Abby saw... Carter injecting Fentanyl."

Silence.

She blinks, disbelieving, a slow, confused smile spreading on her lips. She glances from him to Weaver and back again, their expressions far from suggesting a joke. "What?" Gracie lilts, her face slowly falling, "You mean... into himself?"

"Into his wrist," Weaver supplies quietly.

"From what I understand," Greene sighs, "He snuck it from a patient."

Heartbreak is a funny thing. It comes slowly here, steady and clarifying, the kind you don't want to believe at first — but find it difficult not to. All the signs were there. It explained why Carter had stormed out of the lounge not too long ago, refusing to speak to her, to anyone. It explained everything.

Gracie exhales roughly. "Did you know?" Weaver asks gently.

She shakes her head, wildly blinking away tears of upset and worry. "No," she says, pausing on a second thought, "I mean... he's been struggling, I _know_ he has. A lot more than he lets on. He hasn't been himself, but I just thought... I just..."

"I know," Greene sighs, looking disappointed with himself. "I don't think any of us expected this."

Weaver speaks next, and her tone is firm, but surprisingly gentle. "Will you stand behind our decision to get him some help?"

It is quiet. Gracie's chin trembles as she nods her assent.

Some time passes before she is pulled from the work she had returned to, brought back to the same exam room they had spoken in. She finds Dr. Chen, Dr. Benton and Dr. Anspaugh waiting, and she is somber as she sits on the edge of a bed to wait. Greene stands nearby, and it is not long before Kerry Weaver comes in with Carter, who looks annoyed when realization dawns on him.

Gracie finds it difficult to even look in his direction.

"Oh God," Carter laughs darkly, attempting to leave. "Give me a break."

"Carter," Greene interrupts, "just listen."

"No," Carter retorts, turning around to face the group that had assembled. "I told you, I'm on painkillers for my back, but I'm functioning."

Anspaugh pipes up, a voice firm and authoritative, the sound stopping Carter from another escape attempt. "Dr. Carter, you would be wise to be quiet... and listen."

Silence. Carter stays put, but looks furious.

Greene speaks.

"My van is parked outside," he says, sounding decisive. "with a ticket to Atlanta. There's a drug rehab—" A pause, as Carter begins pacing, turning away, rolling his eyes. "—there's a drug rehab center there, that specializes in doctors with addiction."

"Well, that's great," Carter interrupts, "but I'm on prescribed painkillers, and that doesn't make me an addict, and I think you all know it."

He attempts to leave again, and Gracie covers her mouth with her hand, fighting a bubbling upset. "I'm not finished!" Greene retorts firmly.

Carter turns around, stares at him petulantly. "It's apparent to all of us," Greene continues, "that you have a drug problem. Therefore, we cannot allow you to continue working here... or anywhere else, as a physician. So, you have two choices: get in the van, go to the airport, check yourself in... and when you come back, we will support you in any way that we can."

Silence. Carter blinks, straightens. "Or... I'm fired?"

Dr. Greene nods simply. "Yeah."

Carter shoots a long, dangerous look in Gracie's direction, and she shifts uncomfortably. It doesn't end well, with Carter storming from the room exclaiming his resignation, leaving the rest of them standing around looking upset. That was when Gracie finally snapped, sinking deep as she cradles her head in her hands and cries, Jing-Mei's gentle, supportive hand on her back as she did so. Benton runs after him, and it takes a while of quiet, uncertain hovering before they finally catch wind of Carter's reluctant agreement.

Benton had been the one to finally coax her outside. She hadn't wanted to, nearly kicked and screamed over it, but in the end she gave in. The staged intervention that had just taken place in the ER had torn her soul down to the ground, forced her to face a reality she had not been ready to face, and weeping in the on-call room sounded better than anything. She came outside with her feet dragging, only her scrubs and a knitted car coat to protect her from the night air.

Greene and Benton eyed them from the stoop of the ambulance bay as they met in the middle, Greene's van waiting in the distance. She folded her arms around herself. The knowledge of being watched could not be avoided.

He'd been crying. She could tell, even without looking directly at him. She looked everywhere _but_ at him, even when he reached out and touched a hand to her forearm, pulled her close and smelled her hair. She felt that to look at him would be to admit it. Admission was not once of her strong suits.

"I'm sorry," he said. His voice cracked, and it was enough to bring her back to tears. She tried to fight them, nodded vehemently as he pressed her form closer to his side, but in the end she was forced to allow their existence.

"I thought..." He wanted to explain. Explain what, he wasn't sure. Something, anything to make his actions make sense. What he had done. "I thought I could—"

"You don't have to say anything."

"I'm not like him!"

He broke down, and for the first time she looked his way. Pressed his cheek to hers, smoothed down his hair and supported his frame when it became weak with upset. He was supposed to be the strong one, stronger than _her_ anyway, the one that held both of them up. She was quickly learning that wasn't the case.

"John," she said quietly. "You don't have to tell me. I know."

He sniffled, sounding more pitiful than she'd ever heard him, and their eyes met, and her words sounded more firm and confident than she felt. She told him, "This is... this is a good thing, John. But you need to go and sort some things out."

"This?"

He knew what she meant. He'd always known. They were complicated, but they had potential. Greene and Benton were getting antsy in the distance. Their time was short. When she said nothing, he leaned in and pressed his lips to hers. It was slow and sweet, and coaxed tears out to stream down her cheekbones. When he pulled away, he murmured against her mouth, "Will you wait?"

All she could do was nod, and as he stepped away and Benton went to usher him toward the van, all she felt like doing was curling up in a ball on the pavement and screaming for the world to hear. Instead, she allowed herself to be ushered inside by Mark Greene, who left her in the lounge and told her to take as much time as she needed.

**THE END!**


End file.
